The third year of the Principal’s Poetry Prize built on the success of the previous years with many students crafting insightful poems on the COVID-19 inspired theme: “Lockdown” and the 2020 College theme: “Humility.” At the College Assembly on Friday 31^st July, Murray House was crowned as the 2020 Principal’s Poetry Champions and the following individual awards were announced:  

Below, are the outstanding winning poems from the four competitions- Primary, Junior, Intermediate and Senior. 

Primary Winner: Nicholas Christou (6 Goold)

Through The Screen 

Goodbye outside freedoms,
Hello zoom,
It was fun at first,
But now I tire of learning in my room,
Day in, day out,
Tick, tick, zoom,

No soccer on the field,
No learning at the school,
No jamming with my mate,
No swimming in the pool,
Day in, day out,
Tick, tick, zoom,

Click the link
Make a video call,
Type in the password,
Repeat all,
Day in day out, tick, tick zoom

Junior Winner: Hamish Rose (8 Reville)  

Looking Through A Window

I watch the window
People pass by,
They live on the street
But they seem foreign

I’m unsure if it’s the fact
That I can’t speak to them,
or if it’s the fact
That they choose not to communicate

I would help them with the small things
Offering a smile from time to time
But I never seem to make contact
As they slowly pass by

I would learn a language
But which one to choose
It’s as though everyone
Who I knew before?
Has become alien
And forgotten their repo ire

So, I still look out my window
Continuing to wait
Eventually I’ll leave again
Going nowhere now,
As I stare once again the rain begins to come down.

Intermediate Winner: Max Martin (9 Murray)

The Battlefield of Lockdown

The trepidation of advancing outside,
While the lethal virus engulfs no man's land,
Inevitable death, by your officer's command.
However, there was nothing to do but hide.

The weaponry of the infection makes you petrified,
No chance of survival. Just look down and pray,
The orders are something you should not obey.
However, there was nothing to do but hide.

In contrast, this hell will be modified,
And back to your safe, mundane lives we desire,
It will assist you to avoid the gunfire.
However, there was nothing to do but hide.

This virus battlefield of lockdown has died.
You no longer need to hide.

Senior Winner: Rory Graham (11 Goold)

Empty Chairs at Empty Tables

Empty chairs at empty tables
Upright; vigilant; sharp
Dust collects meekly, a docile collection
Although still a hearty sigh
Perhaps it be the mercy of metallic temporal shackles
Subservience is thick; it chokes and strangles to dutiful submission
A fine pulp, sweet ambrosia
A slight pain has always disciplined
The mind
There be but a slither for space
A golden creak of honey
The soul
Bleak upholstering, lifeless; stiff; rigid
Stark stillness.
A gothic overture wraps its icy barren tentacles around
The empty chairs and empty tables
Stifling: a calculated usurpation
But calculation seems romantic
Villainous decisiveness seems virtuous, after all
It slips you through a forest
With looming oaks and impending willows
Syrupy blades of glass dressed in sparkling morning dew
Silky crispness; warmth of anew
A liberal honey of utopia
Of course
Escapism in itself escapes one thing
Or another
You lie: sluggishly
Perhaps overcome by the heavy pressing of your lust
The frosted tentacles slither and slide around, about; onto
But not without seizure
A metallic shackle strikes like a hand on a clock; decisive
You do not drift into the sunny meadow
Instead
You flip upright
A bleak shiver of deep-sea constriction
A gothic overture; thickly packaged, swims methodically
A behemoth kraken
You slip back
A snap of whiplash
Vertical. Stillness.
A bleak upholstering, dusty and parched
An empty chair at
An empty table